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Former Dodgers Minor Leaguer Dies at 35

The outfielder wrapped up his minor league career with Oklahoma City in 2019.
J.P. Hoornstra|
Mar 17, 2017; Fort Myers, FL, USA; Houston Astros right fielder Jon Kemmer (75) against the Boston Red Sox at JetBlue Park. The Astros won 6-2. Mandatory Credit: Aaron Doster-Imagn Images
Mar 17, 2017; Fort Myers, FL, USA; Houston Astros right fielder Jon Kemmer (75) against the Boston Red Sox at JetBlue Park. The Astros won 6-2. Mandatory Credit: Aaron Doster-Imagn Images | Aaron Doster-Imagn Images

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Los Angeles Dodgers

Outfielder Jon Kemmer, who spent the last of his seven affiliated minor league seasons with the Triple-A Oklahoma City Dodgers, died Sunday in a single-car crash in Texas. He was 35.

Kemmer was a free agent when the Dodgers signed him to a minor league contract on June 27, 2019. After he got off to a blistering start in the Mexican League that year, hitting 21 home runs and slugging .714 in 58 games, Kemmer latched on with Oklahoma City for the remainder of the 2019 season.

In 39 games with the Dodgers' top farm team, Kemmer slashed .252/.360/.445. He delivered the game-winning hit, a double in the bottom of the ninth inning, to lift Oklahoma City to a victory in his first game.

Kemmer elected free agency after the season. He played four games in the Dominican Winter League, but didn't latch on anywhere for the 2020 minor league season, which was ultimately cancelled in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

A Pennsylvania native, Kemmer was drafted by the Houston Astros in the 21st round of the 2013 draft out of Brewton-Parker College in Mt. Vernon, Georgia.

In the years that followed, Kemmer became one of the Astros' top prospects as the team rebuilt into a perennial American League powerhouse. By 2016, Kemmer was the No. 13 prospect in the organization according to Baseball America, and No. 21 according to MLB Pipeline.

But Kemmer never was promoted past Triple-A, despite flashing plus power (34 home runs from 2016-17) for the level. The Astros traded Kemmer to the Minnesota Twins in 2018. He played only 39 games in the Twins' system before heading to Mexico.

According to Explore Clarion, which cited the Galveston County Medical Examiner’s Office, Kemmer’s vehicle “was traveling on rural Farm to Market 2004 when his vehicle left the roadway, struck an electrical pole and rolled at approximately 6:09 p.m. Sunday.”

Kemmer was coaching the Texas-based HTX Battle Bucks 14U travel baseball team. Last weekend, the team competed in the Triple Play Classic in Houston. Kemmer was returning home from the tournament when the crash occurred.

“In 2013, his rookie year in pro ball he was playing for the Tri-Valley Cats just outside Albany, N.Y.,” Chris Rossetti of the YDL Sports Network wrote April 13. “My dad and I went on a minor league baseball trip and Tri-Valley was one of the places we stopped. Jon took the time to meet my dad and to talk to us. He was just that kind of person.”

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J.P. Hoornstra
J.P. HOORNSTRA

J.P. Hoornstra is an On SI Contributor. A veteran of 20 years of sports coverage for daily newspapers in California, J.P. covered MLB, the Los Angeles Dodgers, and the Los Angeles Angels (occasionally of Anaheim) from 2012-23 for the Southern California News Group. His first book, The 50 Greatest Dodgers Games of All-Time, published in 2015. In 2016, he won an Associated Press Sports Editors award for breaking news coverage. He once recorded a keyboard solo on the same album as two of the original Doors.

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